Leek, Potato and Bacon Hotpot with Jarlsberg Cheese

A Simple One Pot Recipe – Leek, Potato and Bacon Hotpot:

Do you sometimes forget how much you like an old recipe? Leek, Potato and Bacon Hotpot must have been one of the first things I made as a student – pure comfort food, it really comes into its own in the winter months when having something cooking for supper in the oven is almost mandatory. But, it’s been at least couple of years since I made it and the revival of my Leek Potato and Bacon Hotpot is all down to a Jarlsberg cookery event.

A month or so ago I was invited to the Good Housekeeping Institute to meet Signe Johansen and some of the people from Jarlsberg Cheese all as part of the Jarlsberg #makeasandwish campaign.

We learnt that Jarlsberg is the product of a fusion of Swiss cheese making and Norwegian dairy produce that dates back as far as the 1820s when some Swiss cheese makers visited Norway and realised that the terroir would give the cheese a unique flavour. The cheese all but died out until 1956, when a group of students and scientists recreated the ancient recipe. The result, Jarlsberg, is a delicious cheese, ripened for a minimum of 12 months, which is versatile enough to work as well in an everyday sandwich as it does in a whole variety of dishes.

Signe Johansen helped us to create a new twist on macaroni cheese – she showed us how to make a lighter mac, using stock instead of milk and adding no flour. Of course, the cheese used was Jarlsberg. Then we used the mix as a stuffing for tortillas, pimping the mixture up with everything from mushrooms and ham to a hot chilli sauce. Jarlsberg is a great cheese to use for cooking, it melts very easily and can be grated as a topping then browned off in the oven for a delicious golden crunchy topping.

We took some cheese home and I decided to make one of those recipes that I’ve cooked since student days. It’s a very frugal way to use up a little leftover bacon, ham, chicken or sausage and the end result is comfort food that I’m happy to eat over and over again. Sometimes I’ll use a leek, sometimes shallots or onions. I’ve also made the same dish substituting the potato for celeriac.

This Leek Potato and Bacon hotpot is a very simple one-pot supper dish. Change it up by using sausage or cooked chicken instead of the bacon, or by omitting the meat altogether for a vegetarian option.

Course:
Main Course, Main Dish

Ingredients

1Medium LeekTrimmed, cleaned and sliced into 1cm pieces

150gJarlsberg CheeseGrated

2Medium PotatoesPeeled and sliced into rounds

200mlChicken or Vegetable stock

100mlMilk

50gButter

Salt and Pepper

2-3thin slices Back Bacon

Optional

2teaspoonsCornflour

Fresh Parsley

Instructions

Fry the bacon gently in the bottom of a heavy based casserole. If necessary add a little oil or butter to stop it sticking but you should find that you can just use the fat from the bacon. Once the bacon is cooked, set to one side

Add half the butter to the pan and melt. Stir in the leeks and sweat gently over a medium heat till the white parts start to go translucent. Sprinkle over the cornflour if you are using it and cook for a minute or so. Set to one side

Add the rest of the butter to the pan and melt. Add a layer of potatoes, then a layer of grated cheese, then a layer of bacon and leek. Season with salt and pepper and continue layering, reserving about 1/4 of the cheese and finishing with a layer of potatoes. Pour over the milk and stock and stir the whole mixture gently so that the layers are mixed up a bit.

Top the dish with the remaining cheese and cover with a lid. Bake in a preheated oven at 170c for around 30 minutes till the potatoes are soft through, then remove the lid and turn the heat up to 200c for the final 10-15 minutes so that the cheese on top browns

Garnish with fresh chopped parsley

It’s a pot of gooey, rich, comfort. Something to eat on an evening when you don’t want to stress about dinner but you DO want good, homemade food. Try eating it with a crunchy green salad or with a helping of ratatouille. Or enjoy it as it is, straight from the pan. I’d call this a hotpot simply because I make a deeper pot of it that a standard gratin – but if you wanted to, it could easily be cooked and served in a shallow gratin dish – just reduce the cooking time accordingly.

With many thanks to Jarlsberg for my samples of cheese and for a great evening cooking with Signe Johansen. And for the inspiration to recreate a dish I use to love!

About Fiona Maclean

Comments

Oh my god, that looks divine! Sometimes being lactose challenged is harder than others, this is one of those recipes that makes it blatantly obvious what I’m missing out on!
Off to pin it for those that are more fortunate 😀
Janie x

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